Constantinople
What the Quran has to say about slavery
While it attaches high moral value to emancipation, it acknowledges the legitimacy of slavery and the sexual exploitation of woman – justifying forced concubinage by certain Islamic regimes
For God or Allah: the savage wars between Christians and Muslims over the ages
It’s impossible to say which side excelled in imaginative barbarism in this blood-soaked history spanning 1,300 years
The spy with the bullet-proof Rolls-Royce
Stationed in Paris from 1926 to 1940, the wealthy, debonair ‘Biffy’ Dunderdale, often seen as a model for James Bond, was also a supremely effective intelligence officer
The glory that was Greece
Imagine a new take on the Greek myth of Pygmalion. A love-shy artist makes a woman out of marble who…
From nomads to emperors
This is the best of times to be writing history, since so much of what has been taken for granted,…
The war that changed the world
It was not a war to end all wars, writes James Howard-Johnston at the start of this illuminating and thought-provoking…
Days of glory
Ian Thomson describes Ravenna’s golden age, when classical Rome, Byzantium and Christianity met
Tell them of Battles, Kings and Elephants, by Mathias Enard, reviewed
Michelangelo seems never to have travelled to Turkey to advise the Sultan on a bridge to span the Golden Horn,…
The last hurrah
Sound the trumpets. Let rip the Byzantine chorus of clattering bells and gongs, the thunder of cannons, drums and flashing…
